


I was born a restless child, And I could hear the world outside calling me

by Frog_that_writes



Series: beverly's awful no good very bad legs [1]
Category: Not Another D&D Podcast (Podcast)
Genre: M/M, because i project so hard it's unhealthy, bev's got chronic pain after the watchmen, no one @ me i'm a teen too i'm allowed to write about kids my age, semi graphic description of injury at one point, teenage boys making out in the forest like dumb teens, why do i do this to beverly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:27:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24281293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frog_that_writes/pseuds/Frog_that_writes
Summary: Beverly deals with the consequences of shattering your legs even a year after the fact. Erlin just wants his boyfriend to actually say something when he's in pain.
Relationships: Erlin Kindleaf/Beverly Toegold V
Series: beverly's awful no good very bad legs [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1754392
Comments: 7
Kudos: 71





	I was born a restless child, And I could hear the world outside calling me

**Author's Note:**

> me:  
> my brain: what is beverly had chronic pain  
> me: oh my god WHAT IF BEVERLY HAD CHRONIC PAIN  
> this ends a lot more silly than it starts tbh

His legs still hurt sometimes.

Beverly always privately thought it was funny. That after all this time (barely a year, wasn’t it? A year ago he had set off for a jamboreen and now here was, feeling centuries older) after every battle and every scar, it always came back to his legs.

He still remembers being left reeling after the biggest idol he had ever had was just confirmed to never be as good as people made her out to be. He remembers standing at that temple, staring eyes to millions of eyes with a god, an idea popping in his head. He was so young back then. A year younger. So, so much younger. 

He doesn’t remember the fall very well. Empty air at his back, the shocked and horrified faces of his friends looking at him and reaching out as though in slow motion. Then there was nothing but crushing pain, biting down on his tongue so hard his mouth filled with copper, doing his best not to look down. They came here to know things, but that was something he didn’t want to know. How the mangled terrifying splay of bones and skin and blood that his mind couldn’t even process connected to his body.

Hardwon and Moonshine did their best, healing his legs the best they could and carrying him. It had been a long walk back to Galaderon, every step on the uneven dirt rode sending another spike of pain through him that he swallowed down with a shaky smile. And they got him home, and insisted his parents get the healer while he dad lectured him, not that it was undeserved. 

He remembers the exhaustion after Merrick finished, remembered reassuring his friends that it didn’t hurt at all anymore while the cleric sent him looks that said he knew that was untrue. But that part didn’t matter so much as they way they slept together that night, in his bed that was built for a teenaged halfing and definitely not a full grown human and half-elf, let alone all three together. He woke up in the middle of his bed the next morning, Hardwon snoring as loud as ever and Moonshine sleeping, for the first time, next to him. He got out of bed on shaky legs, grimacing at the way he could still feel the deep ache in them. It took a few tries and a lot of clutching the wall until he was able to make it downstairs, prepared to make the apology breakfast he had made for numerous B minus on report cards and other failures to live up to his dad’s standards in the past. 

He knows worse, now. He knows being so, so close to death that you can feel yourself beginning to let go. He knows pain. 

But back then it was the worst he’s ever felt, and it wasn’t entirely from shock that his knees began to buckle when he found out his father was to be executed, the same way he had executed criminals before him. 

-

The pain faded, most of the time. It’s always there, a subtle reminder of his mistakes, but it’s usually just that- subtle. Very rarely does it feel the same way it did on that day, with such a stiff soreness it feels like his ankle might snap a little more with every step he takes. His bones are fine now, they won’t break at the drop of a hat, but he still feels the lingering pain as though they might.

It’s easy to ignore most days. When his greatest problems now are school and Erlin and teaching the kids at the crick to read. (And wasn’t that an adventure, trying to get any number of youngins to sit still long enough to look at one measly little book. But he would never claim it wasn’t rewarding, that he didn’t still get that rush of pride he felt the first time Moonshine and Hardwon had been able to stumble through a book on their own every time the kids pointed at a word they recognized.) When he was surrounded with friends and knew everything was going to be okay, it wasn’t such a big deal when he wasn’t entirely sure if he was capable of walking. When every day was a constant struggle for their life, it had been a lot of grit teeth and sucking it up, but he was _safe_ now. If he wanted to, he could spend the whole day on a stump, battering away nannerflies and watching youngins run around. Or he could hole up in a library, devouring all the books he hadn’t been able to read for a year. Or he could do… _things_ with Erlin, sitting on one of their beds and hoping no one distrubed them, not that they went much further than pg-13. The point was, he could choose what he did these days, and sometimes that involved taking a break on those occasions that his bones felt bad. He had options.

Except for when Erlin decided they should go on a hike.

-

It was an easy trail. The first one they had hiked as green teens, actually, back when they could barely even hold their swords. If a group of ten year olds barely even inducted could climb it with a scout master who was more nervous than they were, two teens who had fought a god could certainly manage it. It would even be fun, too, the two of them finally getting a moment of being alone and stupid in the woods, like all teens deserved. Really, it was a great idea, and when Erlin had suggested it a week ago he had been nothing but excited.

He knew the moment he woke up on the day they were set to hike that his legs were not going to cooperate. He could tell just from the way his knees clicked when he dragged himself into a standing position that way his bones ached wasn’t going to go away after a bit of stretching, no matter how much he wished it would. 

But he and Erlin had been so excited. The war was still so fresh in everyone’s minds, and no one ever turned down a chance to forget and just be alive in the moment. Their alone time was infinitely more numerous now than it had been months ago, but it still felt insufficient at times. It sometimes felt like the world should have stopped, should have held their breath and broke down and looked at this great big tragedy in the face, mourn every day and never stop, but that wasn’t how the world worked, nor should it be. They kept moving. They were busy, rebuilding and repairing and healing and teaching. They were on their way to becoming scout masters themselves soon, and they had lives. 

So they planned a day together. An easy hike of a trail they both knew and sitting by the river for hours until they reluctantly decided it was getting dark and they should go home. Far be it from Beverly to say no to that because of something he had been dealing with for a year. 

He had some tape left that they had used to bandage wounds when they couldn’t afford to spare heals, and if he wrapped it just right around his knees they didn’t hurt as badly a lot of the time. But it was warm enough that he was definitely going to be wearing shorts, and he didn’t want Erlin to worry if he saw him wearing bandages. He could forego it, he would be fine.

So he packed his bag with snacks and went off to meet Erlin just like they had planned, hoping that the way his knee was already starting to buckle wasn’t a sign of how the whole day was going to go. He tried to ignore the way it felt nearly as bad as it had for the days after the fact, he was probably just exaggerating it to himself. He had gotten hurt millions of times since then, and so had his friends. Nothing else had seemed to stick the way this did.

“Bro!” Erlin smiled as he spotted him approaching, which instantly removed any thoughts of pain from his mind. Gosh, those freckles…

“Hey Erlin,” he smiled back. “You ready?”

“Yeah dude! You’re the one who’s late,” he laughed good naturedly, shoving Beverly’s shoulder slightly. 

“Am I?” he asked, looking down at his watch and noticing that he was in fact fifteen minutes late for when they had agreed to meet. Shit, looks like it had taken him longer than he thought to get here. That probably had something to do with the whole pain thing. “Sorry, guess I underestimated the walk here.”  
“Don’t worry about it,” Erlin waved, reaching down to grab his hand. “C’mon, let’s get going so we can make it back before night.”

“Still scared of the dark?” Beverly teased, ignoring the fact that they had, in fact, been equally scared of the dark as kids, a fact Egwene had made fun of them for relentlessly.  
“No. Shut up,” Erlin ordered, shoving him slightly harder this time. Beverly laughed and attempted to hide a wince when it caused him to step down a bit too hard on the leg that was giving him the most trouble that day.

“Fine, fine,” he said once he had calmed down from laughing enough to speak. “But just so you know, I stocked day _light_ in case we’re out here past dark, don’t worry,” he mock reassured.

“That just proves that you’re the one scared of the dark,” Erlin scoffed, then, more quietly, “I stocked the _light_ cantrip too.”

They both laughed at that, Erlin after a moment of pretending to be offended, which honestly was one of Beverly’s favorite parts about their time together. How much of it they spent laughing. It never mattered what the future might hold or what had happened in the past while they were joking around and holding hands, walking through the forest together. It was nice.

They continued on mostly in silence, sharing soft laughs over absolutely nothing every few minutes. Beverly found himself having to fight not to squeeze Erlin’s hand after a while, biting down on his bottom lip instead as the pain seemed to get worse. Occasionally his knee would nearly buckle, causing him to trip, which Erlin was always quick to tease him for, assuming he just hadn’t seen whatever obstacle he had run into.

“Remember that?” Erlin asked, stopping suddenly and pointing to a small area free of trees by the river. “That’s where we stopped that first time, after Denny got tired and told us to pitch the tents. We ended up sharing one, remember?”  
Beverly did, and he flushed when he recalled the memory, even though they had been ten at the time and hadn’t done anything but tell bad jokes and sleep. Derlin and Cran had even been in the same tent, sleeping right next to them. Still, he remembered the way Erlin had fallen asleep first, and Beverly had spent what felt like hours afterwards staring at him in the dark, trying to count his freckles and memorize the way they arched over his nose, how a small cluster of three sat beside his temple, sometimes covered by a lock of curly red hair, and the one small freckle over his lip, which had always secretly been his favorite. He had always been a little gone for Erlin, admittedly, but it was mutual, so he didn’t feel too embarrassed. 

“Yeah,” he laughed. “Remember how it had been our first time ever pitching a tent, and it took us nearly an hour to do it?”

“Cran had been the first one to figure it out,” Erlin smiled, still staring at the spot. Beverly was too, and he could almost picture it, the group of four young halflings unfolding a tent twice their size in sheer confusion. God, they had been so small back then. They were still small now, overall, but Erlin was actually tall for a halfling and Beverly didn’t mind being short when it meant his tall boyfriend could rest his head on Beverly’s when he was standing behind him. 

“She was always great at that stuff,” Beverly said. “You should have seen the house she built in the fae wild. We both know Derlin probably wasn’t helping much with that.”

They laughed, even though they both felt that weird juxtaposition of remembering Derlin and Cran as they’ve always known them, kids their age, and comparing that to the way they are now, adults. They’re still always going to have that bond of a green teen’s first troupe, but Beverly sometimes thought with a tinge of bitter sweetness that it was odd having a kid nearly his age named after him. Lots of things were odd, these days. Least of all the feeling of seeing the people you had once played with as children now grown up and married with children while you were still sneaking off into the woods with your boyfriend. 

“I can’t believe we only managed to make it this far on our hike,” Erlin commented.

“Yeah,” Beverly agreed, even though his legs were screaming in favor of stopping here. “It took us, what, nearly a whole year to make it to them top, didn’t it? Probably at least fifteen attempts before we could do it in a day.”

“Yeah, but that was only because of Denny,” Erlin snorted. “We were ready for it by August.”

“I don’t know, we were kind of wimps back then. Remember when you guys got kidnapped by bullywugs?”

“You would have too if you hadn’t come late!” Erlin protested.

“I know! That’s why I said _we_ were lame.” Beverly knocked their shoulders together. 

“Sure,” Erlin scoffed. “Man, I wish I would have stayed with you guys instead of coming straight home.”

“I’m glad you were safe, but that would have been kinda cool,” he smiled.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“We should keep going,” Erlin suggested, tugging him along. Beverly just barely managed to hide a pained exhale when his legs suddenly had to move again after beginning to lock up due to standing in place. Something must have shown in his face though, because Erlin slowed down and turned to him. “You alright dude?”

“Totally!” He picked up his pace some in hopes Erlin would accept that as proof.

“Are you sure?” He asked, still looking skeptic. “You look a little off. We can stop for a bit if you need.”

“No!” He said quickly, then, more calmly. “Nah, I’m super good! Let’s keep going, we’re going to pass that little waterfall I fell in that one time and Cran had to save me.”

“Ha, yeah I remember that,” Erlin said, brightening again. “But I would hardly call it a waterfall, dude, it’s like ankle deep.”

“The water falls, what else would you call it?”

“Good point, dude, you’re so smart.”

“Not as smart as you.”

They passed the waterfall after a brief playful argument over who was smarter, recalling the time Beverly had indeed fallen in the river when trying to stick his hand in it. They moved on quickly, pointing out to each other all the memories they had on the trail. They had spent so much of their childhood on it or in the nearby woods, running around without a care in the world. They had both cast their first spells here, telling scary stories and praying to Pelor and living. 

“We should take a break for a little bit,” Erlin suggested, looking down at his watch. Beverly startled.

“Oh, we can keep going if you want, I’m completely fine.” Erlin shot him a confused look.

“Uh, I know babe, I just thought we could like, make out or whatever for a little bit, but if you don’t want to we can keep walking.”

“Oh,” Beverly said, then, “Oh! No, yeah, totally, haha, making out, cool.”

“You’re such a dork,” Erlin smiled, shoving him against a nearby tree and leaning forward. This time Beverly wasn’t able to hold in a gasp, the pain only having gotten worse the longer they walked. 

“What’s wrong?” Erlin asked, pulling back immediately. Beverly was too busy trying to control his breath to respond. Shit, his vision was like ninety-nine percent dark spots 

“Are you having a panic attack?” He continued, gently helping him to the ground. Beverly automatically and unconsciously reached a hand out to grip his knee, trying to keep it in the sweet spot between fully bent and fully extended where it didn’t hurt as much. 

“No,” Beverly gasped out eventually. “Hold on, give me one second and I’ll be fine.”

“You’re obviously not fine,” Erlin scoffed. “Are you hurt? I have a bunch of healing spells stocked, hold on.” Beverly was already shaking his head. 

“Healing spells won’t work,” he said. “I’ve tried them before. My legs are just… bad, sometimes. It’s fine.”

“Your legs are just… bad?”  
“Yeah, like my bones start hurting. It’s not that bad, I think you just surprised me.” Erlin looked unimpressed. 

“And healing spells don’t work? Even high level stuff?”

“Nope,” Beverly gave him a grin he hoped was casual but was probably shaky. “So don’t worry about it babe, I’m super fine.” Erlin was quiet for a moment, clearly thinking about something, and Beverly was about to get worried when he continued.

“Remember that really old book of cleric spells you got me a while ago?” He asked. Beverly nodded, confused. “Well, there was this spell in it that people don’t really use a lot anymore, since it’s faster to just ask people what’s wrong or give them a general cure wounds, but it’s kind of like a diagnostic spell, I guess? I don’t have it stocked, so I’ll have to do it as a ritual, but I might be able to figure out what’s wrong? It’s really not good for you to just be in pain.”

“It’s really not that bad,” Beverly tried one last time. Erlin looked pointedly at where he was still clutching his leg. “But if you don’t mind, it couldn’t hurt, I guess?”

“Of course I don’t mind,” Erlin leaned forward and pressed their lips together for a quick kiss. “Now hold still, this’ll take a minute.” 

Beverly watched as Erlin pulled out a familiar book and flipped through it before arriving at the page that presumably held the spell. He closed his eyes and gently laid his hands on his leg, softly muttering a string of words and a prayer to Pelor. A soft green light emitted from his hands, covering Beverly’s body and beginning to change colors. The light hanging in front of his face, roughly following the shape of his scar, shifted to a pale gold while it changed to a dark red over his legs. A few scattered areas were a light blue, but the majority of his body remained green. Beverly had no idea what that meant, and instead just focused on Erlin, thinking about how cute he looked when he concentrated. He scrunched his nose up whenever he cast long spells like this, which just made his freckles stand out, which was super adorable. 

“Dude,” Erlin blanched when he opened his eyes. “Your legs are like, _fucked.”_

“Really?” Beverly asked, confused. “I know that they hurt a lot, but I didn’t think it was that bad.”

“Babe, I felt it when I was doing the spell, I don’t even know how you’re walking.”

“You just get used to it, I guess,” he shrugged. “Did you figure anything out?” Erlin shook his head.

“Not anything very useful, at least,” he sighed. “But you’re right, healing spells aren’t going to work. I think there are some spells I could use to numb the pain though. Bev, how did this even happen?”

“Oh,” Beverly flushed. “Um, remember when you asked me about my scar and I told you I tried to play a trick on a god?”

“Yes, Beverly, I remember that you told me you tried to poison a god.”

“Not poison! Just… prank.”

“Right,” Erlin rolled his eyes fondly. “Is that how your legs ended up like this too? I thought you said it was just a short fall.”

“Yeah, well, I may have, um, left a part out? It may have been more like a few hundred feet?” Erlin closed his eyes and took a deep breath.  
“Dude,” he said slowly. “What the fuck.”

“Heh, yeah, it was pretty crazy. Merrick Highhill himself healed me, so I’m really not sure why my legs are still all conked up.”

“Well, did you rest afterwards?” Beverly had a flashback of running around Galderon, failing a duel, freeing his dad from prison, and trying to save the city.

“I slept afterwards, yeah.”

“Babe, you are incredibly concerning.”

“My dad was going to be executed, I really didn’t really have time for a week of bed rest,” he attempted to defend himself. Erlin sighed again and began rummaging through his book again. He arrived at a page and muttered another prayer and waved his hands over Beverly. This time, the effect was much faster.

“Oh my sweet P,” Beverly whispered. “Holy shit, my bones don’t hurt.” He gingerly stood up, holding onto the tree for balance until he realized he didn’t need it.

“Good,” Erlin nodded, standing up as well. “I think the spell is supposed to work for eight hours, but it depends on the severity, and you’re super fucked. And it only means you don’t feel the pain, so your legs are still going to be weak and they’ll still hurt worse when the spell wears off if you work too hard.”

Beverly was barely listening, experimentally extending and bending his leg. As soon as Erlin finished speaking, he launched himself forward, pulling him into a hug.

“Holy shit,” Beverly whispered. “This is the first time my legs haven’t hurt in a year. _Thank you._ ”

“Of course, man,” Erlin said, hugging him back. “Just tell me when they hurt in the future, okay? That spell is super easy, it’s just not super common because most stuff can be healed completely. I don’t even have to waste a spell slot if I cast it as a ritual!”

“I love you,” Beverly said, pulling out of the hug. 

“Love you too,” Erlin smiled. “Just promise you’ll tell me if you’re hurting in the future, okay? We don’t need to do stuff like this if you’re in pain. I don’t mind just sitting around if I get to spend time with you.”

“You’re such a dork,” Beverly said, but he nodded. “I will. Thank you.”

“Let’s head back, you’re going to be in so much pain later if we keep going.”

“You said the spell lasts for eight hours right?”

“Well, yeah, but like I said-”

“So maybe we have some time to do what we originally stopped for?” Beverly bit his lip.

“Wh- Oh. _Oh,_ Yeah, I think we can spare a few minutes.”

It was a few hours before anyone saw the teens again, coming back from their hike smiling from ear to ear, holding hands and not at all subtly trying to pull up the collars of their shirts.

**Author's Note:**

> when i wrote that line about erlin being tall i immediately fell in love with that headcanon so now erlin is taller than bev i don't make the rules  
> i really need to write stuff with moonshine and hardwon, but as i teen it's just so much easier to relate to bev, and i love projecting on him oop  
> i just have,,, so many emotions about beverly. Just, as someone who grapples so badly with feeling like their childhood is over and feeling like they can't connect with it anymore, and i never even had to fight a god.  
> had fun writing this, not sure if i love the final result tho. oh well lmao. Please leave a comment or kudo if you enjoyed, i would very much appreciate it!


End file.
